The Supreme Judicial Court will hear arguments on Thursday in the latest chapter of a years-long dispute between developers who want to build a big box store in Greenfield and neighbors who oppose the plan.

"It's the longest battle over a big box store in the country that I'm aware of," said Al Norman, who lives in Greenfield and founded a national group called "Sprawl-Busters" that opposes big box store development and is helping the neighbors.

"(The neighbors) are holding the development hostage with delay," said Greenfield lawyer and city councilor Isaac Mass, who represents Citizens for Growth, a citizens' group supporting commercial development in Greenfield. "Their interest is to make the project economically nonviable by delaying until the investors and developers choose not to tie up their funds anymore with this project and move to something else."

In a way, the conflict dates back to 1993, when Walmart tried to open a store on French King Highway in Greenfield. After a battle between the store and much of the neighborhood, the town held a referendum and narrowly defeated plans for the new store.

The latest iteration of the conflict began in 2004, when the Greenfield town council voted to rezone a nearby plot of land, the Mackin Construction Company site, on French King Highway to allow for a big box store. In 2006, Connecticut developer Ceruzzi Properties began looking for a tenant for a store at the site. In 2011, the developers - through a subsidiary called Greenfield Investors - received a special permit from the Greenfield Planning Board to build a 135,000-square-foot big box store. Greenfield Mayor William Martin supports the proposal.

No tenant has been named for the store.

"We believe that the big box store proposal went through the proper permitting channels," said Marshall Senterfitt, a Boston attorney who represents Greenfield Investors. "That was a long, thorough process, and everything that should have been done was done, and the permit was issued."

A group of seven neighbors challenged the permit in court, arguing that they would suffer damages if the store were built. But the case has gotten bogged down in a dispute over which court has jurisdiction - which is the issue that will be considered by the Supreme Judicial Court.

"The case has never had a hearing on its merits," Norman said.

The neighbors filed suit in Housing Court. Greenfield Investors tried to transfer the case to the permit session of the Land Court, which is in Boston. The case has since gotten delayed by a series of motions and rulings related to which court has jurisdiction.

The neighbors say the Western Division of the Housing Court has authority by law to consider large-scale developments. The developers say when lawmakers in 2006 created a special session of the Land Court to deal with large-scale developments, as a way to expedite the permitting process, it stripped the Housing Court of that authority. Citizens for Growth sided with the developers, while the Massachusetts Fair Housing Center, a non-profit dedicated to eliminating housing discrimination, is siding with the neighbors in court briefs.

Northampton attorney Thomas Lesser, who represents the neighbors, said the Supreme Judicial Court could leave the case in Housing Court, allow the case to be dismissed or remove it from the Housing Court but let the neighbors argue their case in Land Court or Superior Court.

Mass has chartered a bus to bring supporters of the development to Thursday's court hearing in Boston, where they plan to hold a rally before the oral arguments. Mass said he is bringing the bus because there is strong interest in the case in Greenfield. He also wants to counter an argument made by the neighbors, who say moving the case to the Land Court in Boston will make it harder for Western Massachusetts residents to attend hearings.

But the bus has drawn derision from the neighbors. "I don't know if he knows whether he's going to a legal hearing or a football game," Norman said. "Does he think the highest court in Massachusetts is affected by the number of people who show up to hearing, or does he believe it's a show like 'American Idol,' if you bring a lot of fans you get the votes?"

Jurisdictional issues aside, the case is ultimately about whether a big box store is good or bad for Greenfield.

The neighbors worry about the impact of the store on their neighborhood. "It dramatically affects their property values. It dramatically affects their way of life in terms of noise and traffic," Lesser said. "It's a huge development, much larger than necessary."

Norman said the store would be the biggest retail space in Franklin County.

But Mass countered that the store would bring entry level jobs to Greenfield, while giving consumers a chance to buy goods in town rather than going elsewhere. It would also increase the town's tax base. "Every major planning document in the history of Greenfield for the last 20 years has supported the building of large scale retail in Greenfield as part of the commercial mix," Mass said.

Senterfitt said despite the delay, as far as he knows, the developers remain interested in completing the litigation and moving forward with the project.